This series isn't do or die. We play the Tigers 9 more times AFTER this series (including the last week of the season).

Both teams have comparable schedules, mostly inter-division games or games against weaker teams. The only real challenges in the schedule are with the Tigers having 4 games against TB and instead we have 3 against Texas.

I disagree with downplaying this series. It's huge. It's not life or death, but it's stable condition v. critical condition. 3 is much better than 5. You can make up 3 in a week, to make up 5, you've got to reel off an 8 of 10 or 10 of 15 to catch up.

You've got everybody beating everybody in the Central, where Detroit holds the best record in inter-division play.

You have to win at home within your division. You just have to. We haven't done that since May and you see where it's gotten us.

One of the next two is absolutely imperative. Both of them is very welcomed. You can't let them leave town up 5, heading to Baltimore and us playing pesky Minnesota. Can't let it happen.

A God Damn dead man would understand that if a minor league bus in any city took a real sharp right turn, a Zack McCalister would likely fall out. - Lead Pipe

The Tigers' odds of making the playoffs decreased by 7.6 percent last night. That is significant. If the Indians lost last night, they'd have been down to about 3 percent odds. It was as close to a must-win as an August baseball game can be.http://www.baseballprospectus.com/odds/

The Tigers blew a 7.5 game lead in September 2009, there's a ton of baseball left. I just worry about how thin our night-to-night margin of error already is. I think it was pretty important to at least avoid a sweep in this series.

"Well then I guess there's only one thing left to do...win the whole, f***in', thing."- Jake Taylor

skatingtripods wrote:I disagree with downplaying this series. It's huge. It's not life or death, but it's stable condition v. critical condition. 3 is much better than 5. You can make up 3 in a week, to make up 5, you've got to reel off an 8 of 10 or 10 of 15 to catch up.

You've got everybody beating everybody in the Central, where Detroit holds the best record in inter-division play.

You have to win at home within your division. You just have to. We haven't done that since May and you see where it's gotten us.

One of the next two is absolutely imperative. Both of them is very welcomed. You can't let them leave town up 5, heading to Baltimore and us playing pesky Minnesota. Can't let it happen.

I'm not down playing it. It is an important series.

But I'm not going to over-hype it either. Every team in the division is flawed and has bumbled and stumbled to pretty much .500 or less during the course of the season. Yes, getting swept would put you in a hole. Maybe even a considerable one. But each team in the race has dug themselves a hole on multiple occasions this season and I firmly believe they'll continue along those lines going forward.

The original basis last night was people believing the Indians needed to sweep the series and that they'd be buried if they were swept. I don't think either is the case although I'd much prefer the former.

skatingtripods wrote:You have to win at home within your division. You just have to.

You are 100% correct. I think the scary thing is how Chicago is sneaking back into this race. If we don't start winning games in the division or against teams we should be beating, it won't matter if we sweep Detroit for the rest of the season, we won't be in the race.

Nothing better for a bunch of kids and peeps their first time through a pennant race than to make a series in early August life or death.

You guys go ahead and worry about it being now or never. Hopefully the players see it like it is. A series against a division team where they can make up some ground. Or lose some ground. Nothing more. Nothing less.